Ambivalence
by beisel76
Summary: Mark plays 20 questions with the mogs wwhile they have him captive. Slash at the very end if you squint really hard and only if you really want it to be. Could also be friendship, or even just rivalry.


The silence in the car seemed to have swallowed all of his hope, and it to have taken a large bite out of his capabilities of thought as well. A million questions raced through his head to the erratic beat set by his pounding heart. He desperately craved answers to all of these questions that shot straight through his head and ricocheted around his brain in tantalizing arcs, but at the same time he was just _terrified_. And he was _angry_.

"What do you want with him anyway?" he asked his captors tentatively. He tried to put forth a calm, aloof, attitude, but he knew he had failed miserably as soon as the words stumbled meekly off his tongue. For one thing, his voice was too quiet, and he couldn't manage to bring his eyes to focus on so much as their dark and baggy clothes, let alone their freaky black eyes.

"To kill him." One replied. He assumed this one was the leader, because everyone else in the car remained silent and looked somewhat surprised that he had answered. Mark couldn't be sure though. He wasn't sure how to interpret the animation of their features. The thought occurred to him, and at a most inconvenient time, that they looked rather like Great White sharks with those slits on either side of their noses.

"What did he do?" he asked. His voice was a little surer than it had been the last time he spoke.

"Nothing. He simply exists."

"Then why do you want to kill him?" He had his confidence back now. Sensing this, the creature on his left delivered a harsh strike to his temple. The motion was so fluid and swift that Mark really had no idea if he had been hit with a steel weapon of a flesh and bone limb.

The other creatures erupted in conversation now. They spoke in a language that Mark couldn't even begin to understand. He assumed it was their native tongue, and focused on inflection. The one in the front, the leader, still seemed calm. He was almost content, maybe even amused. The one driving was annoyed. The ones on either side of him were angry, annoyed, and possibly hungry, from the way the one on his right was ogling him.

All three of them were silenced by the leader eventually. They averted their gaze, but Mark swore he caught the glimpse of several grins. His suspicions were confirmed when another statement by the leader was met with warped laughter. Oh Dear.

"We want to kill him for the same reason we killed the others, and for the same reason that we will kill the rest of his kind – They are in the way."

"And when you've finished with them?" Mark asked, certain that he did not want to know the answer. He knew he had been right when the leader met his gaze in the rearview mirror and smiled toothily at him. His teeth were razor sharp.

"Then we will exterminate your kind."

"Why did you start killing his kind in the first place?" Mark asked.

"We needed their planet. Ours is quite urbanized and polluted; we ran out of resources. Now we have depleted those on his planet, and yours is the closest in compatibility, and by far the richest." He explained.

"So, Global Warming does exist? Al Gore's not a nutjob?" Mark countered with genuine curiosity. He regretted that this was a conversation he would most likely never be able to recount to his Dad, or his biology teacher.

All of them must have understood him, because they all laughed once more. Mark found the sound even more disturbing and abrasive than he had the first time he heard it.

"Global Warming does exist, yes, both as a natural process and as one exacerbated by pollution, but I am not quite sure of Mr. Gore can be exonerated just yet."

If he hadn't been in fear for his life, Mark might have found that really funny. His dad would have, if he hadn't been passed out with a bleeding skull against an electrical post on the side of the highway about twenty miles behind them.

"So, what has he told you about Loriens boy? I mean, it's not surprising that you've caught each other's interest – both intrepid hero-types and noble hearts and all that."

He had no idea what to think about that one. Alright, that was a lie, but he was in a life or death situation – he could feign obliviousness if he want to, right?

"I don't know what you mean." He replied smoothly.

"Come now Boy! We can smell you all over him!" the one beside him butted in with an amused grin.

"Better than smelling you." He shot back before he could remind himself of what his role was in the situation.

He received a round of laughter at his expense and a hard blow to his head from his newest conversational companion. This one knocked him out cold.

Part of him was thankful, but another part of him was still terrified of the unknown of the whole situation. Yet, as he slipped into unconsciousness, Mark felt that he might have earned more questions than answers out of the ordeal conversation he had just suffered through.


End file.
